I am an evil giraffe. Who no longer blogs about politics.

Said speech was in Osawatomie Texas no, wait, he meant Kansas, where President Barack Obama hopes to recreate a little electoral magic represented by Teddy Roosevelt’s speech in 1910… to wit, splitting the Republican vote and thus getting a Democrat elected. The speech itself is pretty mediocre, even by this President’s standards: but then, if you’re looking for deathless prose then you’re following the wrong Presidential administration. As Ace of Spades notes, President Obama seems to have a definite problem with this entire capitalism thing; to which I would add that this is really a perfectly normal position to take… if you are a person who has spent his entire adult life being paid from an account funded by other people’s tax money.

Also, it is probably mean-spirited of me to note that the three most obvious major differences between Obama’s speech and Teddy Roosevelt’s are these:

Teddy Roosevelt knew who John Brown was (I understand that Osawatomie Brown is a sore topic for Democrats, of course).

Teddy Roosevelt started his speech by endorsing the notion that throwing out politicians who broke campaign promises was a darn good idea (I understand that Obama’s habits of routinely breaking his word is a sore topic for Democrats, of course).

Teddy Roosevelt could draw a crowd (30,000 vs. Obama’s 1,200). Smart of the White House to pick a high school gym, though: that way they don’t have to worry about too much in the way of open space.

OK, true, that’s just one way of looking at this fascinating exercise in clueless class warfare.

To set the scene: below is an annotated excerpt from the ‘independent’ video that is currently causing shortness of breath (and soon probably lightness of wallet) among the contingent of the Online Left who really and truly believe that their professional politician class is avoiding full-throated, Huey Long-style, Left-populist rants for no good reason. Well, Elizabeth Warren, new-minted sacrificial lamb Democratic candidate for MA-SEN, is there to give ’em what they want!

What do they want? To tax the poor!
When do they want it? Right now… wait, what?

Yeah, there’s the problem there. This interpretation (which I first saw from Lee Stranahan) of what Warren was trying to say takes into account rhe minor detail that making our current tax system more ‘fair’ will first require us to go out and tell the 45% of American households not paying income tax that they need to start paying income tax. Elizabeth Warren’s too afraid to do that, of course – heck, she wouldn’t even show the elementary courage needed to support Obama’s dead-on-arrival jobs bill – so I did her a favor by putting up the video. Because, really, it’s very responsible of her to take the position that taxes need to be raised – gathered – on people making less than fifty grand a year. Pure political suicide, but responsible. (more…)

I’ve said to Republican leaders, ‘You go talk to your constituents and ask them, “Are you willing to compromise your kids’ safety so some corporate-jet owner can get a tax break?” ‘ ”

Just in case any viewer missed his class-clashing message, Obama referred to corporate-jet owners at least three more times before he took his second question.

It’s shameless because President Obama has only one rhetorical trick, and that’s to demonize everybody who disagrees with whatever faux-Hegelian position he’s ended up taking on any given day. It’s particularly clueless because what the President apparently doesn’t know is that the latest iteration of the tax break in question was put into place as part of Barack Obama’s own 2009 “stimulus.”

Just a few months after lawmakers scolded auto executives for flying to Washington in private jets, Congress approved a tax break in the stimulus package to help businesses buy their own planes.

The incentive — first used to help plane makers recover from the 2001 terror attacks — sharply reduces the up front tax bill for companies who buy assets like business planes.

Six months from now, when it becomes clear that your party’s attempt to fuel class warfare among the American citizenry has failed, and you need to assign blame… do consider this? It’s not precisely smart to assume that the same people that you’ve spent the last year targeting with a crude sexual innuendo are going to happily fall into line when you start thundering pseudo-populist rhetoric about all those evil banks. Particularly after your little escapade with the pharmaceutical industry.

Enjoy your morning!

Moe Lane

PS: Try not to sound too much like the Democratic party is buying into an international Jewish conspiracy when you do your program: I understand that it’s a traditional peril for wild-eyed ranters about our financial system, but the USA has an international reputation to protect.

Wealthy Wall Street financiers and other business figures provided crucial support for Mr Obama during the election, backing him over the Republican candidate John McCain as the right leader to rescue the collapsing US economy.

But it is now dawning on many among them that Mr Obama was serious about his campaign trail promises to bring root and branch reform to corporate America – and that they were more than just election rhetoric.

A top Obama fundraiser and hedge fund manager said: “I’m appalled at the anti-Wall Street rhetoric. It was OK on the campaign but now it’s the real world. I’m surprised that Obama is turning out to be so left-wing. He’s a real class warrior.”

It’s a powerful temptation; worse and worse, it’s a justified one. You knew and I knew that this was going to happen. You knew and I knew that the upper classes were going to be subject to the Democrats’ faux-populism soon enough. You knew and I knew that they were going to raise tax rates on the wealthy, and never mind that it won’t actually work. And you knew and I knew that when Rahm Emanuel informed the world that you never let a good crisis go to waste, he meant it. So, it seems almost a duty to mock the people who are just now coming to the realization that they’re not only going to get beaten with clubs; they’re going to get beaten with the clubs that they themselves have paid for. (more…)